Cretan daggers
 

hi. I suppose these are antique Cretan daggers, right? What else can be added? Nice or ordinary samples? Eftihis' and any other comments pls??

regards

I was always told by my Greek friends that Cretans were ( and still are) fiercely Greek and devoutly Orthodox, and that the island was never really "dominated" by the Turks.
Why then Islamic dating? The date ( 1295?) is post-revolutionary. Are we totally sure that these daggers are specifically Cretan Greek ?

Ariel, I don't think they were majority but there was always Turkish population living there for sure until 1900s-finally 1923 (exchange of population between two countries) starting from 17th c. I know quiet many people who say their grandparents were migratants from Crete. I already didnt name " Cretan Greek" but just "Cretan". Was very normal for local Turks in Crete to have similar bichaq fashion with local Greeks and to have islamic date on them, and the date is 1295 - 1879,which is from the era of Turkish administration, and I even wonder if gregorian dated samples from 1870s or earlier exist or not (Eftihis?). But if someone says these are not from Crete, that's another issue.

Hi! First these are definitely cretan daggers, no doubt about it.
They are ordinary working examples, propably from the same maker.
(They have in common the "double edge" towards the point, which is unusuall). I would also say that they look a bit more modern, towards early 1900s, because of the lack of proper decoration on the metal strip between the handles. At the 1870s time, still most daggers had a scroll floral decoration engraved on this metal script. The simple "zig-zag" decoration starts latter, maybe from 1890s and then in 1920s or so we have no decaration at all, as one of the examples. Industrial revolution affected all societies, so less time was devoted to a specific knife.

Ariel, muslims and Christians in Crete had exactly the same knifes, the difference being the date, being either in islamic or gregorian callendar, according to customer request.
But of course, in battle these can change hands, and i dont think the new owner bothered so much about it!
And Crete, after many revolts become independant in 1897, and then united with Greece in 1913.
"The never really dominated by Turcs island" is generally a myth, with the exeption of the area of Sphakia in the white mountains.

To give a short summary, from the beggining of the turco-venetian war on Crete and the occupation of the west part of the island in 1645, a big part of the population became muslims. These cretan muslims reached a 40% of total population after the unsucessfull revolt of Daskaloyiannis in Sphakia in 1770.
Well, these were sort of "different kind of muslims", who continued to drink wine and eat pork, and they never even learned the turkish language exept a few words.
The muslim population started diminishing after the rbig revolution of 1821, which in Crete lasted 10 years. Especially after the 1866 revolution, many muslim villages returned to Christianity. The remaining muslim population fortified itself in cities and big villages away from the mountains, with the bigger part leaving Crete after the independance in 1897. The remaining 25.000 or so, were exhanged obligatory with Christian Greeks from Asia minor in 1924 during population exchange.
Population exchange was a solution but a tragedy as well. I will just quote an old person that described: " The "turks", left our village during population exhange. Many of them were relatives, (same surname, 3rd cousins or so,)which spoke the same language with us, had the same facial features, dance d the same dances, had the same attitude towards life, etc, and the "Greeks from Turkey" came to take their place. Yes, they were Christians, but they spoke only Turkish, have different faces , culture and dances and nobody of us wanted to talk to them, or married with them!"
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretan_Muslims
and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretan_Turks

To go back to bichaqs, inscriptions with Christian dates are rare before 1870.

Eftihis,thank you for the comments.
About the populations issue, i agree with the only opposition about the origin of Cretan Moslems, thinking there were Turkish colonists from Anatolia as well as conversions, parallel to the strategy Ottomans has applied to many other newly occupied lands .But still I will translate & use your inputs to tease a little bit a friend of me who's from a Crete migratant family ;)
Yes, population exhange caused Christian community with Turkish ethnicity disappear as a culture .In Turkey there were Orth.Christians using Turkish in praying and identifying themselves as Turks .Their leader rejected the allied invasion over Turkey after ww1,left Fener Greek church which supported the invasion, many from the community helped or joined the resistance army etc., but still only their patriarch's family was let to stay in Turkey in the 1924 exchange and to open his own independent church with the name "Turkish Orthodox".
Anyway,about the bichaqs, I guessed so. Then as there is no surprise,they can get ready for some exhange oppurtunity or sale :)

Erlikhan, no need to tease your friend, national identity has nothing to do with each person ancestors, and if someone believes he is a Turk or a Greek i do not know if someone can oppose that.
So there is no dispute that cretan turks today have a pure turkish identity. But is good to know how this groop evolved. I will give the comments of a Turkish historian:

"The establishment of Islam was mainly the result of conversions. During the Venetian period, the island was devoid of an Orthodox Church hierarchy. The local Orthodox priests were subjected to the authority of Catholic bishops....

What is unique about Crete is the equation between colonization and the high rate of conversions to Islam...The limited colonization and the extensive Islamization of the island resulted in a rather hybrid population of muslims in faith but Cretan in terms of customs and language. In order to fully comprehend the "hatred" of the Orthodox population towards the Turcocretans and their longing for their land after they were forced to evacuate the island in the 20th century, one would have to examine the formative years, soon after the conquest of the island...Until recently, it was unknown that Ottoman documents including kadi records from Crete, Salonica, Kavala, Vodina and the islands were brought to Istanbul during the population exchange....When the Ottomans arrived in Crete, the Orthodox population of the island was devoid of an established Orthodox Church.... In Crete however, the rate of conversion is considered relatively high....the traditional policy of colonization of a conquered territory by Moslem settlers was not applied to Crete". Elif Bayraktar-THE IMPLEMENTATION OF OTTOMAN RELIGIOUS POLICIES IN CRETE 1645-1735: MEN OF FAITH AS ACTORS IN THE KADI COURT.

date on a cretan knife
 

Hallo, speaking on Cretan knifes, can somebody help me with this date?
I am pretty sure this is a late 19th century knife, but the date is much older?
Any ideas?

Eftihis,sorry I just had oppurtunity to log into the forum after my last reply. I didnt know that source you copied for sure. Then it means Crete was really somehow different . As far as I understand the high rate of conversion was because of existing religious problems and instabilities,similar to the ones in Bosnia,causing bigger portion of formerly Christian Bosnian population convert to Islam and create Boshnak people.
The dating on the bichaq must be 1924 in Arabic numbers but Gregorian calender according to me.

1924 date
 

Interesting that the 1924 date coincides with the date of the population exchange. Maybe some type of rememberence?

rand

ottoman translation please
 

Rand, i have no idea on that...
Meanwill what about the inscription and date on this one?

Date
 

Hey Eftihis,

Date looks like 1295 or 1878 (western year)

First number was easy....

The second number is a bit blurry.....

Third number my best guess...

Fourth number a piece of cake....

1295 X >.03= 38.85, round off to 39
1295-39 = 1256
1256 + 622 = 1878

Whats your opinion?

rand